John Luckman News Today

The tagline of the magazine in question, Popular Western, was “Complete Quick-Trigger Stories,” which could apply to Ruscha’s photographs but not to his paintings. Even his silliest paintings are stately and brooding, often to a fault. The character of the brooding evolved over time. If the later paintings are—often but not always to their detriment—more explicit about our world on fire, the ’60s work prioritizes pleasure: the laid-back loops of the gas pump hoses, the blocky, confid...